“The dog without feathers” and the Sartrian traditionontology

Abstract

Having the essays published by Jean-Paul Sartre in the 1940s as a starting point, we analyze “O cão sem plumas” (“The Dog without Feathers”), by João Cabral de Melo Neto (1950). We seek to observe if its forms and materials mean or do not mean the word, designating it as an undeclared representation of the real universe. The problematization of the limits between poetry and prose broadens the construction of the social universe resignified via literature. Complex semantic constructions and figures of speech which constitute the allusive game played by Cabral, especially the metaphor, indicate that the use of figurative writing does not move in totum the Speaker away from a transparent or even an utilitarian employment of language.